


here I blur into you

by camellialice



Category: The Goldfinch - Donna Tartt
Genre: Canon Compliant, Las Vegas Era, M/M, Recreational Drug Use, Theo POV so uhhh not the most reliable, just a couple of guys being dudes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-04
Updated: 2020-01-04
Packaged: 2021-02-22 12:10:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22115758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/camellialice/pseuds/camellialice
Summary: meditations on touch, on those confusing and fucked-up nights, on souls too mixed up in each other: Theo and Boris, the Las Vegas years
Relationships: Theodore Decker/Boris Pavlikovsky
Comments: 32
Kudos: 205





	here I blur into you

**Author's Note:**

> title from "Pre-Amphibian" by Margaret Atwood  
>  _but here I blur_  
>  _into you our breathing sinking_  
>  _to green milleniums_

At first it’s just casual touches. An arm over shoulders, a kick to the leg, sides pressed against each other, jostling for space on the couch. Horsing around in the kitchen, chasing and grabbing at each other. Wrestling in the pool, pulling each other under, slippery skin sliding against skin. Sprawled next to each other in bed, moving closer in the night for comfort, waking up sleepy and entangled. Lying on the grass, head on stomach, hand in hair, scratching absentmindedly.

This is important for the rest of it. It’s context. It would be easy, Theo knows, for someone on the outside to misconstrue the nature of their relationship without this perspective. For someone to see their closeness, the way they interact, and make assumptions about what they are. Theo’s certain, in fact, that no one but Boris and himself could possibly understand what they actually mean to each other. He’s not sure he even knows how to explain it to anyone else.

To Boris and Theo it’s just instinct, it comes to them like breathing. There is no thought or intention behind the touching; it’s a logical consequence of their proximity. The more time they spend together the more Boris feels like an extension of himself, a bizarre alien appendage who smokes like a chimney and curses in languages Theo doesn’t know. Sometimes it feels like they are one soul in two bodies. More often it feels like they are two souls in one body, twisted and tangled up in each other.

So, in context, any escalation is just a natural progression of what they already have. It’s just the erosion of the final boundaries between them. It doesn’t have to mean anything. It’s just touch.

  
  


They’re reading on opposite ends of the couch, their legs tangled in the middle. Boris’ foot keeps kicking against Theo’s hip and eventually Theo whacks it with the spine of his book.

“Stop that,” he snaps, and Boris looks up from his book innocently.

“What?” he asks. “Reading?”

Theo kicks him with his own foot. “You know what, asshole.”

Boris grins and sits up. “I’m bored. Let’s play game.”

“I’m reading,” Theo protests, although he knows he won’t be reading much longer. “What game?”

Boris throws his book on the coffee table and pulls Theo’s out of his grip as well. He kneels at the far end of the couch and holds Theo’s big toe between his thumb and forefinger.

“Are you nervous?” he asks.

“No,” Theo says. “What the fuck, Boris?”

Boris smiles and slides his hand down Theo’s foot, resting on his ankle. “Now are you nervous?”

“No.”

Boris walks his fingers up Theo’s shin. “Now?”

“This is a dumb game, Boris.”

Boris squeezes Theo’s knee. Theo’s leg kicks without permission from the rest of Theo. Boris raises an eyebrow.

“I’m not nervous, I’m ticklish,” Theo says with a glare. And then quickly adds, “Don’t you dare try to tickle me, Boris.”

Boris doesn’t. His hand keeps moving up, along Theo’s thigh. He’s kneeling between Theo’s legs now. Theo sucks in a breath. It’s definitely weird, but he gets the sense that if he says anything he’ll lose the game.

Boris is watching Theo’s face carefully. His hand moves slowly, gently, sliding along Theo’s jeans, and Boris moves with it, leaning in towards Theo. His hand reaches Theo’s waistband and hovers there, fingers barely brushing the skin of Theo’s hip. “What about now?” he asks quietly.

Theo looks him dead in the eye, does everything in his power to make sure he doesn’t blink. He shrugs. “Not nervous.”

Boris leans in closer, bracing himself with his other hand against the arm of the couch in order to do so. His fingers slip just over the edge of Theo’s waistband and there’s a shock of cold against Theo’s bare skin as Boris shifts the angle of his hand. Theo can feel Boris’ breath against his cheek. He forces himself to hold eye contact, not to flinch away, to match Boris’ confident intensity. 

“Now?” Boris whispers.

Theo so badly wants to say no, but his eyes flick down to Boris’ mouth inches from his own and the word gets caught in his throat. He’s hyper-aware of Boris’ touch on his skin, of Boris’ eyes watching him, of Boris’ legs tucked between his own, of Boris’ gravitational pull that always keeps him in orbit, that’s now threatening to tug him into something he’s not sure he’s ready for. So instead of denying it he bites his lip and Boris, who knows him too well, recognizes his hesitancy for exactly what it is.

And bursts into a fit of laughter, shattering the moment with a sharp  _ HA! _

Boris falls back towards his side of the couch, still cackling. “You fell for it! Ah, Potter, you should have seen your face! Ha! Like a scared goose!”

“Shut the fuck up,” Theo grumbles, bright red and hoping the couch cushions might swallow him whole. “You don’t even know what a goose looks like.”

“Is bad chicken,” Boris counters. “Or, what is phrase about scared deer? The one who is still?”

“Deer in headlights?”

“That’s you! In headlights. Ha!”

“Whatever,” Theo says. “That was freaky, anyone would be freaked out.”

“Not me,” Boris shrugs. “I am no coward, I guess.”

Theo kicks him. “It’s a dumb game, Boris.”

But it troubles him later, because it’s not the first time Boris has touched him, not even the first time Boris has touched his bare skin, his hip. That sort of thing is normal for them. It’s how they are. But something was different this time and he  _ was _ a little nervous, after all, even if he can’t explain why. And it’s that part that bothers him when he lies awake in bed that night, while Boris snores gently with his arm flung across Theo’s torso, his fingers resting limp against Theo’s hipbone. It’s the same position Boris always falls asleep in, but tonight his fingertips burn Theo’s skin.

  
  


Some mornings he wakes with Boris curled around him, spooning him, a protective shield between Theo and the outside world. It’s not unusual for Boris to take up this post when Theo screams or twitches in his sleep. Boris will wrap himself around Theo and hold him tight until Theo’s breath evens again, and Theo will clutch the arm thrown around him like a drowning sailor clinging to a raft. And sometimes Boris will move away again in the night, roll over in his sleep, but sometimes he doesn’t and they wake up twisted together like this.

Theo knows that, despite his relentlessly chipper exterior, Boris has not had an easy life himself, and sometimes he thinks that maybe Boris has nightmares too that he isn’t willing to talk about. There are nights when Boris will moan in his sleep, instinctively reach for Theo, pull him close and hold him tight. Theo lets himself be pulled and wonders what it is that haunts Boris on those nights, what could possibly frighten brave, brash Boris.

And some nights, because they are teen boys and these things happen, Boris will grind against Theo in his sleep, or Theo will wake up to feel Boris hard against him. He doesn’t say anything, because what is there to say that is not embarrassing to everyone involved? After all, it’s just Boris’ dick. There’s nothing mysterious or exciting about that. They’ve seen each other naked plenty of times, showering or changing or skinny-dipping in the pool. And it’s not like he makes a point to look, but he knows it’s there and he’s seen it, flaccid and hanging between Boris’ legs, and he knows that Boris has seen his. You can’t be that familiar with a person, with a person’s body, without encountering all of their body. It’s only weird if they make it weird, if they treat it as something sexual, if they treat it as something other than just another consequence of their proximity.

Sometimes he’ll move away or flick the sleeping Boris or just pretend he doesn’t feel it pressing into the back of his thigh. And sometimes, because he’s a hormonal teen, he wakes up hard himself. And sometimes, trickier to explain, Boris grinds against him and Theo feels himself become hard. When that happens he does slide out of bed and into the privacy of the bathroom, and when he returns Boris has often shifted back over to his own side of the bed. And Theo can slip back under the covers and fall asleep again, back to back with Boris. And he will never say anything, never tell him what happened, and they will never talk about what goes on in the night, under the covers, under the veil of sleep.

  
  


Theo wakes up to the taste of stale vomit and barely stumbles out of bed before he retches again, wrapping his arms around the trash can and clinging to the plastic bag for dear life. He’s so preoccupied with emptying his guts that he doesn’t even notice Boris wake up until he’s crouched beside him, rubbing small circles onto Theo’s back with the palm of his hand. He’s murmuring gently and Theo still doesn’t understand Polish but he knows the words are meant to be reassuring. When there’s nothing left to throw up but bile he slumps back, leaning into Boris’ shoulder. Boris wipes the hair from Theo’s sweat-slick forehead.

“Every night I tell you to drink water, Potter,” he chides fondly. “Do you ever listen? No, and I am the one to clean up in morning.”

“I don’t remember you telling me that,” Theo mumbles. He still feels a little dizzy and is glad he has Boris, at least, to fall on if he passes out.

“You remember nothing,” Boris retorts. “Always you blackout first.”

Theo grunts. Boris hands him a tissue and he wipes his mouth with it.

“Breakfast time, I think,” Boris says. “Shower first. You stink of puke.”

“Fuck you,” Theo says weakly, but lets Boris pull him up, walk him to the bathroom. He’s just wearing a pair of boxers and he steps out of them as Boris starts running the water.

“Sit,” Boris instructs. “No standing or I have to mop up your brains too.” Theo climbs into the tub obediently, sits cross-legged under the shower head, and closes his eyes as the water runs over him like rain. It does help. When he’s feeling a little steadier and has scrubbed thoroughly he gets out, wraps himself in a towel, and heads back to the bedroom to dress.

Boris is waiting for him with tea, fruit, and toast. Theo picks up a mug to take a swig and gags again, this time at the sugar content. “This is yours,” he says.

Boris rolls his eyes. “I know this.” He swaps mugs with Theo and starts peeling an orange.

Theo takes a bite of toast, dry and bland but all he trusts his stomach with right now. As he chews slowly he watches Boris work, how his nails pierce and tear at the peel, how his entire face is focused on his task. There’s a dark bruise, he notices, blooming at the base of Boris’ neck, just above his collarbone. His heart sinks and he sucks in a sharp breath.

He leans over and brushes the bruise with the tips of his fingers. “You didn’t tell me about this,” he says. 

Boris shoves a section of orange into his mouth. “Is nothing.”

“Your father?”

Boris chokes on his orange and glares up at Theo. “Is nothing, Potter. Keep your nose away from my business.” He shrugs away Theo’s hand and bites into another orange section, not looking at Theo. He always does this, shuts down when Theo tries to comfort him, shrinks away when Theo most wants to hug him.

Theo can’t take his eyes off the bruise as he drinks his tea. He traces its outline with his eyes, tries not to imagine how it got there. It’s in such a delicate place; his collarbone might have been broken if it were an inch lower. Or an inch to the right and it would have hit his jugular. Theo feels a spike of wrath, a wave of sadness, a creeping helplessness. He wishes he could take care of Boris like Boris takes care of him.

  
  


“Potter,” Boris says, and when Theo doesn’t respond immediately he elbows his side. “Potter, hey.”

Theo tears his attention away from the glittering reflection of lights dancing on the surface of the pool. “What?”

“I want to try something.” Boris flicks ash off the end of the joint. “You trust me, yes?”

“Sure,” Theo agrees. The water is lukewarm and almost entirely still. He rotates his ankle slowly, drawing a circle with his toe underwater. There’s barely a ripple on the surface of the water. He wonders where that motion goes, how he can stir up the water from underneath and have the movement be imperceptible from above.

“Stay like this,” Boris instructs and scootches closer to Theo. There’s the disturbance Theo was looking for, rippling out from the motion of Boris’ legs. Theo looks back up at him.

“Okay.”

Boris takes a deep hit and then turns towards Theo. He takes Theo’s face in one hand and gently pulls his jaw down, his thumb pressed against Theo’s chin. He leans in until their mouths are nearly touching and exhales smoke into Theo. Theo doesn’t realize at first what’s happening, doesn’t start inhaling until too late.

“Wait,” Theo says as Boris starts to pull back, “I fucked up. Do it again.”

Boris laughs. “Pay attention, Potter. You are ready now?”

Theo nods and Boris takes another long pull on the joint. Then he leans in towards Theo’s mouth again and releases the smoke. This time Theo’s ready and he draws Boris’ breath into his lungs, feeling the tickle of the smoke in his throat.

“Okay?” Boris asks.

“One more,” Theo says, and Boris complies. The smoke passes between them again and this time Boris doesn’t pull back from Theo, just lets his mouth hover a hair away from Theo’s own. They are so close that Theo’s exhalation is enough to upset the fragile equilibrium, causing their lips to ever so faintly brush against each other.

It’s not like one of them leans in (though it would be impossible to tell who, if they had). Whatever space is left between them closes, their open mouths pressed together. Boris tastes bitter, like coals and burnt grass, like Theo’s licking the joint itself. He wonders what Boris tastes like when he’s not smoking. 

Then Boris separates, pulls back to take another hit. Theo slips the joint out through Boris’ fingers and sips at it as Boris blows smoke into the sky. He passes it back to Boris and then lets his body slide over the edge of the pool and into the water. He closes his eyes as he sinks, thinking of ripples and waves, his breath sequestered and contained inside his chest.

  
  


The next morning he walks into the bathroom and finds Boris at the sink.

“What the fuck?” he says. “That’s  _ my _ toothbrush, asshole.”

Boris shrugs and bends down to spit.

“You’re disgusting,” Theo says.

“You prefer I not brush teeth?” Boris asks, toweling off his face.

“I’d prefer you use your own fucking toothbrush.”

Boris waves his hand. “I do not have it here. Besides, is just mouth germs. This is not first time we share germs.”

“A toothbrush is different,” Theo insists.

“Okay,” Boris says, and holds out the toothbrush to Theo. “You want it?”

“Keep it,” Theo sighs, resigning himself to terrible breath for the next couple hours. “It’s yours now, I’ll get a new toothbrush.”

Boris rolls his eyes. “So picky, Potter.”

A thought occurs to Theo as he tugs off his shirt. “Have you been using my toothbrush this whole time?”

“No?” Boris tries, scrunching up his face.

Theo throws his discarded clothes at Boris. They hit him with a satisfying  _ whump. _ “What the fuck, Boris?”

“Is just toothbrush!” Boris complains.

“It’s gross. You’re gross.”

“You are one who throws underwear at me!”

“It’s what you deserve,” Theo informs him and steps into the shower, drowning out Boris’ protests with the roar of hot water.

  
  


Boris finds out that Theo’s never had a hickey and decides to give him one. It is a decision that comes suddenly, without warning or explanation, and Theo barely has time to blink and choke out, “Sorry, what?” in the vain hope he might have misheard.

“Come here,” Boris beckons.

“Why?”

“So I can give you hickey,” Boris explains, like he’s doing Theo a favor.

“Um, no thank you,” Theo says. He feels very warm and hopes it doesn’t show on his face. 

“Is passage rite! Will make you a man.”

“I don’t want a hickey, Boris.”

“You have to,” Boris insists. “I am not friends with virgins of hickeys.”

“You can’t just make up rules like that,” Theo complains. But Boris doesn’t yield and eventually Theo relents.

“Come here,” Boris says again, after whooping in delight. “Give me neck.”

Theo’s brain, unprompted, suddenly supplies him with an image of Boris as a vampire. “Not my neck. I don’t want people to see it.”

Boris rolls his eyes. “Whatever, Potter. Wrist?”

He can’t come up with an objection to that, now that it’s cold enough for long sleeves, so he reluctantly extends his arm towards Boris. Boris takes it and, without preamble, without warning, latches his mouth onto it. Theo nearly jumps out of his skin.

It doesn’t feel like what he expected. He thought it’d be like a kiss but harder, which in retrospect sounds ridiculous. Instead it’s like Boris is sucking his soul out through his wrist. He feels the rest of his body respond in kind, his skin prickling and electric, his belly red-hot and squirming.

Boris eventually sits up with a grin. “Congrats! First hickey.”

“You looked like a leech,” Theo tells him and looks down at his arm. There it is, the shape of Boris’ mouth stamped on his skin, still wet with spit.

The bruise looks exactly like the one on Boris’ neck and something clicks in Theo’s brain. It wasn’t from his father. It was from someone else.

Boris leaves to steal chips from the kitchen and Theo sits on the floor, reeling. He feels so cold where he just felt so warm, like he’s been doused in icy water.

He doesn’t understand. He doesn’t understand how this happened, when this happened, why Boris didn’t tell him. They spend all their time together, at Theo’s house, in the pool, in bed. Every morning Boris wakes up next to Theo and chooses not to tell him.

Worst of all, Theo can’t even imagine who gave it to him. Boris hasn’t mentioned anyone to him lately, let alone a girl. Another secret kept from him — why? Because he thought Theo would be jealous? Or because he doesn’t want to have to introduce Theo to her? 

Boris returns. “What is wrong?” he asks, immediately sensing Theo’s discomfort.

“Nothing,” Theo mumbles. He rubs at his wrist with his thumb, as if he could erase the hickey from his skin.

Boris stares at him a moment, standing in the doorway, then scoops up Popper in the arm not holding chips. “Let’s go smoke,” he says and leaves without an answer, as if he knows Theo will just follow automatically.

He’s not wrong.

  
  


They’re lying on the bed listening to music, stoned out of their bodies. Theo feels like he’s floating, weightless, and allows himself to drift with the music, lets his ears and chest thrum with it, absorbs it into his skin. Boris’ hand brushes Theo’s, two knuckles against his thumb. Not an accidental brush. In the language they’ve constructed, the unspoken code they both somehow understand, it means  _ over here, look at me. _

So Theo lets his head loll to the left and meets Boris’ gaze. The music fades to a background whisper as his attention shifts fully to Boris’ eyes, to the way Boris is watching him, to Boris’ smile. Theo thinks of the poolside, of Boris’ lips bitter on his own, and feels the steady pull of gravity tugging at him. He lets himself be drawn in, intoxicated by the weed or the music or maybe something else entirely, and sinks into Boris.

First: lips on lips. Soft. Warm.

Then: a mouth opens and the kiss deepens. Theo falls into it headfirst.

The only thing that exists anymore is Boris’ mouth. Theo’s eyes are closed and everything else simply fades into the shadows at the corners of his consciousness. The only thing he knows is the gentle motion of Boris’ lips, the feeling of Boris’ tongue slipping past his own, the scrape of Boris’ teeth against his bottom lip. Only gradually does he even become aware of Boris’ hands cupping his face and his own hold on Boris’ neck. The kiss is slow, lazy, languid, the kind of kiss that could go on forever, the kind of kiss that does.

He kisses Boris until he no longer knows where he ends and Boris starts, until the kiss consumes them both. The music has long since stopped and neither of them notices. The lethargy of the high slowly washes over them in gentle waves and they fall asleep still curled towards each other.

  
  


It happens like tripping. Not acid, though (in retrospect, with more experience) maybe: a long wait before it hits, so long that you’re in it before you realize, so long that you don’t know it’s happening until you can’t decipher the language of the song you’re listening to.

It happens like tripping over your feet, stumbling over a discarded beer can: a sudden loss of balance, a millisecond of panic, and before you can process what’s happening the momentum drags you down.

It happens like this: they’re tipsy and goofing around like they always do, their lips meet (this is not new), Theo’s tongue is in Boris’ mouth (this is not new), Boris is sucking hickeys onto Theo’s neck (this is not new), their hips are grinding against each other (this, even, is not new) and all it takes is one hand to reach down in between — this is new.

It doesn’t mean anything. It just happens in the heat of the moment. They don’t think it through and they don’t talk about it after. It’s not about thinking, it’s about feeling: the rush of sensation, the wanting, the build-up, the oh-almost-too-much, the release.

It doesn’t mean anything. They’re young and they’re drunk and they’re horny, and it’s not like there are any girls around. This sort of thing just happens. Maybe it’s an accident, maybe it’s a mistake, maybe it’s just no big deal.

It doesn’t mean anything when it happens again, when their bodies collide back into each other, when Theo arches up at Boris’ touch, when Boris babbles in his ear. Cause and effect, action and reaction: Theo tugs his hair and Boris moans, Boris twists his tongue and Theo gasps. It’s always fast and urgent, desperate and sloppy, groping and fumbling and scrabbling for purchase, for anchorage in each other. 

When Boris touches Theo with his hands, with his mouth, it’s like he pours all of himself into it, does it with the same enthusiasm he does everything else, leaves Theo dizzy in his wake. And like with everything else Theo feels like he’s running to catch up, to catch himself, to get Boris back. Boris has always seemed to have a better grasp of himself than Theo and it’s a thrill to be able to undo him, to unspool him, to watch him unravel. Theo can make Boris lose himself like no drug they’ve ever done, and that knowledge alone is intoxicating. Boris already goes through life wild and raw but there’s something about the way his head falls back, his mouth falls open, his eyes squeeze shut, his body jerks against Theo — it’s like a glimpse of Boris at his core, exposed, unfiltered, his soul escaping his body.

Theo’s not falling for Boris. He’s just falling into him, against him, under him, at his knees, on his back. Everything is falling, everything is collapsing and sliding and slipping, losing grip and sinking in, letting gravity take over.

He’s not falling for Boris, he’s just falling apart.

  
  


And then Kotku comes and everything changes.

When Boris touches him now it’s different. Each touch is discrete, quantifiable, where before their bodies were one continuous unit. He can count how many times Boris has touched him today: an arm over his shoulder this morning, their knees bumping together this afternoon, the brush of their knuckles as Boris passes a beer to him. He wonders if Boris has noticed the space between them. He wonders if Boris cares.

When Boris walks in with a hickey on his neck Theo knows it is from Kotku. It glares at him, raw and angry on Boris’ pale skin, an ever-present mark of her claim to him. He wonders if, on a subconscious level, he always knew that the other hickeys were made by himself or if he’s only realizing it now, now as he lays alone in bed and tries to rewind through his bleary blotted memories. Either way he mourns their absence, resents the stamp of a foreign mouth, hates seeing Boris blotched by  _ her. _

It’s not jealousy. It’s not like Boris was his and she took that away. It’s worse than that, a deeper cut: Boris was _him_ , and Kotku has ripped out a part of himself. And yes, Boris is still here, but separate now, amputated from Theo. Theo reaches for him instinctively, like a phantom limb, and when his fingers find air he feels unstabilized, unbalanced.

They’re still friends but things are different, profoundly so. And yet Theo can’t stop remembering, reliving, rehashing, obsessively returning to the past, compulsively recalling those nights when their bodies melted together into one, when their souls were tied up in a knot.

  
  


And then.

And then: the crash, the wake, the coke, the porch.

And then: desperate pleas and whispered bargaining, spiralling goodbyes, a confession tethered to the tip of Theo’s tongue, the world falling out beneath him, Boris’ hands on Theo’s face, the gulf between their hearts widening as the distance between them shortens, Boris’ lips pressed hard against Theo’s mouth, one last point of contact, one last kiss, one last chance, one last abyss to topple into —

and then

for a long time

nothing.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> what if i wrote 4000 words with no real plot or resolution and just posted it on the internet that'd be pretty wild huh


End file.
